Games
by lightmylumiere
Summary: Paige and Henry, tic-tac-toe and hangman fun!


*Weʼre now going to review in this class, so I am going to write to you guys. In the tiny font I canʼt read. So that hopefully my teacher wonʼt. Make sense to you all? The common thing in my classroom is playing games, yet here I am writing. Teachers should be proud right?  
Enough with my senseless rant. Iʼm going to start writing my one-shot now.  
So review once your done. Itʼs common courtesy.*

Games

They sat side by side in the classroom, looking at their teacher to make sure she wasnʼt watching them. Or- according to Henryʼs theory- he kept glancing over to his grandmother to make sure he didnʼt have her attention. Paige didnʼt care why Henry was so careful, she was just enjoying the thrill of them not doing their fifty math problems. "I donʼt know why she gives us all this work when she knows weʼre not going to do it." Paige wrote neatly in cursive on the scrap piece of paper she tucked under the hardback cover of her math book. Henry read it and ran his fingers along the ink, getting glitter all over his fingers from her purple glitter pen.

"Ms. Blanchard at least lets us work together." Henry wrote beneath in his less-beautiful pencil and imperfect cursive, switching to print halfway through his writing.

"But she doesnʼt want us talking. Our groups are ineffective. All Mattie ever does is sleep on his textbook while we do our work, and Lisa takes this time to fix her hair. I think Ms. Blanchard just wants an excuse not to teach us anything we can use in the real world."

"What would we learn if we were learning if she taught us something we COULD use?" Henry was hopeful that sheʼd give fairy-tale answers the more people he asked this to. His answer was always writing or reading or psychology. What about sewing? Or woodworking? She was writing away, and he couldnʼt wait to see what was on her mind.

"Psychology. Reading the human mind is crucial I think. If you know how a person thinks, you know how to bring them up or tear them down." She smiled at Henry as he read this, then whispered in his ear. "Sheʼs not listening to us. Sheriff Swan is here checking up on her."

"Okay Paige." Henry whispered back as she drew a tic-tac-toe board.

"X or O?" Paige asked, scribbling her pen in the corner to get the ink flowing properly.

He wrote an O in the center of the board. She put an X in the top right corner. O in the bottom right. X in the top left. He grinned at her and put an O in the middle left box, thinking he was bound to win. Then she drew a nice X in the center top square and smiled at him brightly, seeing the look on his face. He had just lost a game he thought he was sure to win. "Try again?" She asked coyly, a giant smile slapped on her face.

"New game." He growled and drew a hangman board. One blank, space. Five blanks, space. Three blanks, apostrophe, two blanks, space. Four blanks, end of puzzle. "Choose your letters wisely."

"Henry, itʼs just a game." Paige joked, seeing his frown return to a smirk. "R." Third word, fourth letter. R.

"S."Head on the hangman.

"T." Second word, first letter. Fourth word, third letter.

"L." Spine.

"E." Third word, fifth letter. Fourth word, last letter.

"I has to be a letter." He wrote all the Is on the board. First word. Second word, third letter.

"U?" Third word, third letter. Forth word, second letter.

"A?" Left leg.

"O." Third word, second letter. She smiled brightly.

"I think youʼre... I donʼt know the last word." He filled in those blanks, and left the one empty blank. It was starting to make sense to her. "Cute? I think your cute."

He felt smart. Even if she was answering a puzzle, he had said something nice about him. Then the question came up that he didnʼt want to answer ever in his life. "Do you really think that?" He nodded stupidly to her question. She started to write her own puzzle. First word, one letter. Second word, two letters. Third word, three letters.

"I" He guessed. First word, I.

"O." Second word, second letter. Third word, second and third letter.

"T?" He wondered, and saw the T appear in the third word first blank. I something too.

"If itʼs not T, is it G?" She shook her head and drew a head on the hangman post. "D?" She wrote the D and he read the message. I do too. Did that mean something or was he reading too far into these three short words. "You do?"

"Youʼre a nice guy, Henry." Ms. Blanchard reentered the room and looked at them sternly. Paige shifted uncomfortably in her seat as she breathed. "We should go to Grannyʼs sometime." Henry looked surprised, Ms. Blanchard watched her roommateʼs son carefully pretending not to hear a word they were saying.

"Today?" Henry offered. "Emmaʼs supposed to come and get me around seven. She said thereʼs something important, having to do with Operation Cobra." Ah yes, the operation. Where everyoneʼs a fairy tale character. She had seen him drawing this out on all his scrap paper, castles and costumes. SHe thought heʼd be an illustrator, she hoped he would be. Yet those two words- operation cobra- she felt that her hopes were all down in the dirt. "If my mom saw me with you though..."

"Same with my parents. They always flip out when I see strangers. Theyʼre afraid something badʼll happen to me." Theyʼre scared youʼll meet your father, thought Henry. "But what they donʼt know wonʼt hurt them, right?"

"I guess..." Henry looked at her and smiled. "but you know this is an interesting game weʼre playing right?"

"I know." Paige grabbed Henryʼs hand impulsively. Ms. Blanchard looked completely surprised, but as they looked to her she buried her head in the book David suggested for her.

*I never said it was a long one-shot. Review anyways.*


End file.
